Beginning Saturday, motor vehicles, registered in Odisha, will have registration number starting with ‘OD’ instead of ‘OR’.
Following the 96th Amendment to the Constitution which paved the way for re-christening of the State from Orissa to Odisha, the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways has allotted the new State Registration Mark OD instead of OR.
Basing on that, the Commerce and Transport Department has notified that the registration number of all category of vehicles within the State, registered under the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988, will begin with OD from September 1.
The registration mark of the vehicles, already registered before September 1 with OR group, will remain unchanged as the notification will be applicable with prospective effect.
The department has also specified registration mark letters for all 31 regions as per Section 41 of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988. As per the norms, the four figures starting from 0001 to 9999 shall follow the registration marks of the respective regions and the next series shall begin with alphabet ‘A’ followed by not more than four figures. Once A series is exhausted, ‘B’ will follow. This series will not be more than four figures and continue till all alphabets, excluding I and O, are exhausted. The four figures should be written without excluding any 0 (zero).
The number of vehicles, registered in Odisha, has been rising by 25 per cent every year. In 2009-10, at least 3,24,471 vehicles were registered in the State. Their number rose to 4,06,206 in 2010-11.
During 2011-12 (till January), 3,46,149 vehicles were registered. There are at least 33,87,000 vehicles on road in 2011-12.